The chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee has issued a strong warning to the Defense Department over plans to award $1 billion in new contracts to the firm formerly known as Blackwater, accusing managers of the private security company of lying to win lucrative jobs in Afghanistan.
Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) also cited a history of [...]
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
For anyone who has a security clearance and doesn’t believe the U.S. faces a cyber-espionage crisis, Colonel Steven Shirley has 102 stories to share with you.
That’s the number of cases in which Shirley’s team of Pentagon researchers discovered cyberspies breaching the networks of government agencies, defense contractors and other organizations with ties to the U.S. [...]
Filed in News Blurbs, Technology
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Also tagged Cyber Attacks, Cybersecurity, DOD, Espionage, Hackers, Hacking, Intelligence, Pentagon, Secrets, Spying, Think Tanks, Universities
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Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Wow, the corruption is/was worse than even my imagination is capable of thinking up… and the DoJ isn’t taking action? WTF?
The former employees who filed the lawsuit, a married couple named Brad and Melan Davis, said there was little financial oversight of the money.
Last year, an audit by the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction [...]
Saturday, January 23, 2010
In Baghdad, Vice President Joe Biden announced that the U.S. will appeal a court decision dismissing manslaughter charges against five Blackwater guards involved in a 2007 Baghdad shooting that killed 17 people including women and children. (Jan. 23)
via YouTube – Associated Press – Biden: U.S. to Appeal Blackwater Dismissal.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
In an interview with the Pakistani TV station Express TV, Defense Secretary Robert Gates confirmed that the private security firms Blackwater and DynCorp are operating inside Pakistan. “They’re operating as individual companies here in Pakistan,” Gates said, according to a DoD transcript of the interview. “There are rules concerning the contracting companies. If they’re contracting [...]
Three private security guards working for Blackwater Worldwide who witnessed a 2007 episode in Baghdad in which at least 17 Iraqi civilians were killed by other Blackwater guards told a federal grand jury that they believed the shootings were unjustified, according to newly unsealed court documents.
Two senior United States military officers who arrived at the [...]
Still, the government has failed to hold armed contractors accountable. When its formal occupation of Iraq ended in 2004, the Bush administration demanded that Baghdad grant legal immunity to private contractors.
Congress has tried to cover such crimes with American law. The Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act extends civilian law to contractors supporting military operations overseas, and [...]
Filed in News Blurbs
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Also tagged Abu Ghraib, Accountability, Blackwater, Congress, Crime, ICC, Iraq War, Law, MEJA, Mercenaries, PMCs, Privatization, UCMJ, War Crimes
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Several victims of a 2007 shooting involving American private security guards employed by the firm formerly known as Blackwater alleged Sunday that they were coerced into reaching settlements, and they demanded that the Iraqi government intervene to have the agreements nullified.
The Iraqis said they were pressured by their own attorneys into accepting what they now [...]
A judge in America threw out charges against members of the Blackwater security company yesterday who were accused of killing Iraqi civilians in Baghdad in one of the most notorious incidents since the 2003 invasion.
The ruling will be met with anger in Iraq, where feelings ran high at the time. Fourteen to 17 people were [...]
Saturday, December 19, 2009
There are many reasons for the progressive division on the health care bill. There are differences over the narrow question of health care policy, with some believing the bill does more harm than good just on that ground alone. Some of it has to do with broader questions of political power: if progressives always announce that [...]
Filed in News Blurbs
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Also tagged Barack Obama, Corporatism, Democrats, DLC, Glenn Greenwald, Intelligence, Lobbyists, Policy, Progressives, Surveillance, Triangulation
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Friday, December 11, 2009
The CIA and the military special forces have quietly expanded the role of private contractors, including Blackwater, to include their involvement in raids and secret paramilitary operations in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq, four current and former U.S. military and intelligence officers tell ABC News.
American law specifically prohibits the use of private soldiers or mercenaries in [...]
“We need to view this sober reality,” Scahill told MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow on Thursday. “The war is in Pakistan right now. There’s no question about it. The question, though, is how much it’s going to expand. … These are actions that are going to destabilize Pakistan and are going to create new enemies for the United [...]
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Welcome to the wartime contracting bazaar in Afghanistan. It is a virtual carnival of improbable characters and shady connections, with former CIA officials and ex-military officers joining hands with former Taliban and mujahedeen to collect US government funds in the name of the war effort.
In this grotesque carnival, the US military’s contractors are forced to [...]
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Top executives at Blackwater Worldwide [now known as Xe] authorized secret payments of about $1 million to Iraqi officials that were intended to silence their criticism and buy their support after a September 2007 episode in which Blackwater security guards fatally shot 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad, according to former company officials.
[...]
Four former executives said [...]
Filed in News Blurbs
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Also tagged Blackwater, Bribery, Cofer Black, Corruption, Crime, Erik Prince, Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, Gary Jackson, Iraq War, Manslaughter, Nisour Square, Weapons Smuggling, Xe
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